To cope with everything, here’s a list with some fun facts, weird parallels, glass onions and speculations.
1. Gustave’s mechanical arm has three numbered rings. They show 3456 - 0123 - 6789 - it’s not a coded message, just an interrupted sequence.
Could be symbolic foreshadowing for Maelle’s predicament:
3456 - life in the outside world, what we see in the “Epilogue” with Clea, before act 3;
0123 - stepping into the Canvas, getting painted over, being reborn and starting anew;
6789 - remembering everything, continuing where she left off.
2. Manor doors' locations are always relevant:
❂ Clea’s room - Frozen Hearts
❂ Verso’s room - Visages, Mask of Anger
❂ Alicia’s reading room - Fallen Leaves, near the Lady of Sap
❂ Renoir & Aline’s room - Old Lumiere (The Fracture ground zero)
But, there are a few suspicious door placements:
❂ Guest room - Stone Wave Cliffs // There are Sophie’s clothes in the closet, and an Obscur peeking through the window.
❂ Library - on an island not far from the Forgotten Battlefield // There is a hidden reading room where you can find Verso’s clothes; the door’s location near the FB is notable either for the Painters-Writers war parallel, or for the fact that it’s Gustave and Julie’s resting place (more on that in a bit)
❂ Glasshouse - near Gustave’s grave (complete with Verso’s mask of sadness on the tombstone) inside the Monolith // seems like it’s implied that the fire started there, as the glasshouse is still under repairs and blocked off, when we get to roam around the real manor
3. Verso leads Gustave to the manor to find Maelle by the typewriter specifically.
When Verso has to leave Gustave behind, he takes the Lumina converter, his hand (don’t forget the metaphor rings) and his journal.
Gustave writing and Maelle taking that up after him is a significant thing that happens. Verso also writes.
4. There are a couple of books in the Manor, the titles of which you can actually make out:
❂ The Illustrated Family Gymnasium - perfectly understandable for a family of artists to have a workout manual, if they don’t want to crumble into fine dust
❂ The Poetical Works and Remains of Henry Kirke White - a tome with some nice graveyard poetry, among other things (a poem about music he composed at 14, for one)
This one’s definitely Verso’s.
5. Verso is named with the word used to describe the back of a painting. Some have unfinished sketches and inscriptions on the back, giving insight into the artist’s creative process and history of the painting.
Renoir is named after Pierre-Auguste Renoir, impressionist painter famous for his approach to lighting and color, and the sort-of “fusing” of the objects in his artworks. The real painter's wife was also named Aline.
Clea’s name is probably a reference to Clio (Kleio) - a muse of history and lyre-playing, daughter of Zeus and Mnemosyne (goddess of memory). While Clio was often invoked by the writers, she’s more about the idea that history is preserved not just through writing, but through remembrance.
Alicia is a play on Alice, paralleling Verso’s Canvas to Wonderland.
Gustave’s name is likely a nod to Gustave Eiffel - our guy is both a genius engineer and a metaphorical heart of Lumiere. His theme will play at the base of Eiffel at the end of the game; ost called "Eiffel" is another rendition of his theme and "Lumiere" (which is also his).
His sister has the same name as Gustave Flaubert’s Madame Bovary - Emma. One of Flaubert’s biggest inspirations was Stendhal, who one of Maelle’s skills is named after. Standhal is a french writer and art critic, who had a psychosomatic reaction named after him - people experience “Standhal Syndrome” (basically a mild panic attack) when overwhelmed by art. And guess what, Stendhal also studied engineering, but chose to pursue writing.
Stendhal was influenced by Jean-Jacques Rousseau’s works, especially “Julie, or the New Heloise”. Coincidentally enough, Stendhal’s most famous novel “The Red and the Black” features a main character named Julien. Both novels focus on social constraints and love’s place in it all - Julien is a funhouse mirror reflection of Julie, using love as a weapon, while she abandons it for duty; he is sentenced to execution and remorseless, she finds redemption in death. It cannot be definitively said that Stendhal’s Julien was really named after Rousseau’s Julie, and then twisted, but it is plausible.
So, we come up to the matter of E33’s Julie, who, without fail, comes up in places and scenes significant for Gustave. They are laid to rest under the same tree; when Verso is sad about Gustave, he’s upset about Julie (and vice versa) - Esquie mentions them in the same breath for him several times; flashbacks about OG Verso’s fate are the only scenes Julie ever shows up in, and those are always immediately followed by a conversation with Gustave; Gustave himself shows up in one of the nightmare sequences - with two intact hands, I repeat, WITH TWO INTACT HANDS; and we can find Julie’s sword at Stone Wave Cliffs of all places.
(Fun fact, this sword's name (Delaram) could be derived from latin "delere"/"deleo" - to erase/to destroy.)
Notably, in this particular scene Verso and Gustave are set up like Clair and Obscur, wearing light and dark clothing. Interestingly enough, while Gustave receives most of the outfits we unlock for Verso in acts 2 and 3, he never gets the Clair outfit, and can only wear Obscur from deluxe.
Getting back to Rousseau-Stendhal books, Julie (E33) is more like Julien (The Red and the Black) - she uses Verso’s feelings against him, betrays him, while Gustave is more like Julie (New Heloise) - he lets go of Sophie to respect her decision about children, focuses on his Expedition duties, selflessly dies protecting Maelle.
This could always be a big ball of nothing, but I tend to see such frequent coincidences as patterns. Gustave and Julie are definitely bound by Verso’s guilt, but was it really necessary to restate it so frequently? Is that really the only thing they have in common?
Can Gustave please stand up and explain why he has Verso’s “From Fire” skill, while surrounded by so much writer-related embellishment?
6. The Lumina Converter is basically an artificial, limited version of a Painter’s power to manipulate chroma. Absolutely insane act of creation with this one. If you need a refresher on how powerful that thing is - remember Dualliste. So many people died trying to best that thing, yet E33 defeated it with a team of 4, all because they had the Converter.
7. There is a possibility that Francois wasn’t based on a real turtle, but on Verso himself. There are reasons to believe that he was a cagey kid, with Clea as his best friend, who then sort-of left him for her duties, like she left Francois.
‘Francois’ meaning ‘a free man’ is incredibly ironic in the context of Verso. Verso learning his gradient skills through Esquie is notable too.
Take a look at this now:
(side note, we'll get to that in a bit, but Verso was scared of the dark as a kid - so probably hated napping alone too)
This conversation about Francois being alone happens immediately after Gustave dies. Makes me squint, when we add the Francois-Verso thing to the comparisons Gustave gets to Esquire, with their rock enthusiasm, shared views and a mission to protect and comfort.
This is making me want to punch a wall:
Again, Gustave dies just after Esquie leaves the cave and Francois ends up alone.
Esquie’s name could be a play on ‘esquisse’ - french for ‘sketch’, or ‘esquire’ - someone who serves under a knight, training to become one himself; or sometimes just someone in service of a nobleman.
8. Clea created the Lampmaster to both poke at and ward off Verso’s fear of darkness. We meet such creatures 3 times: at OG Clea’s workshop, at painted Clea’s workshop in the Flying Manor, and at the Stone Wave Cliffs.
Lampmasters in the workshops are bound on display, but the one at SWC is there deliberately, of its own volition. Might be because it’s there to perform its duty, to ward off darkness for Verso (incredibly unsuccessful, try again)
The Lampmaster at the Flying Manor is in the area you have to descend to, that’s swimming in colors, where nevrons from Stone Wave cliffs and Frozen Hearts roam. Interestingly enough, all other locations here (aside from where painted Clea is) are washed out, bleak, almost monochromatic - it seems like it’s here where all the colors went, and there’s SO MUCH blue. Could be a metaphor for Clea getting rid of her feelings to keep going, hiding them deep, deep down to not drown in grief over Verso like everyone else.
9. If Lune connects with Sirene and Sciel with Visages, Gustave should connect with the Reacher through the method of elimination. And all the tinkering happening there. And having what the Reacher lacks - willingness to let go, maybe?
10. When Gustave plays the piano, it starts sounding off-tune, wobbly and shrill. He's the only character it happens with.
It could be a subtle hint at him not being Maelle's real brother perhaps, not an adequate replacement. Or there's something else that's wrong with him, cause again, what's with the writer stuff, with the fire? All them weird coincidences combined with the fact that the piano hates him does not look good.
11. Gustave is the odd one out again with the starting weapons - his is not named after him:
❂ Scieleson - Sciel
❂ Lunerim - Lune
❂ Monocaro - Monoco
❂ Maellum - Maelle
❂ Verleso - Verso
❂ Noahram - Gustave
Noah from the Bible comes to mind with this, as Gustave is tasked with the preservation of life too. But why single him out like this?
He didn't succeed (yet) with the task of preservation, is the name ironic? A different angle of Noah's story maybe, how he's something good surrounded by evil and decay, but there's so much good in the Canvas apart from Gustave, other wonderful people. What's with that?
Sandfall mentioned that they considered the name "Noah" for Gustave initially, but decided against it. Why leave the weapon unchanged though? As a reference to their creative process, a reminder of where they started?
(Maybe he will get his own real starting weapon in the future when E33 Royal drops and he becomes a full fledged party memb- *gets shot*)
Another interesting thing is that all character-specific weapon names have the same ending (names of Maelle's rapiers always end with 'um' and Sciel's scythes with 'son', for example). Verso and Gustave are a tricky case, as even after Gustave is gone Verso gets swords with his own ending (so) and Gustave's (am). "He can't use those, but I will" type energy? Restating the lack of Gustave once again?
12. On that note, the party group shots are often uneven, leaving free space for someone to fit in. So mean.
13. Why do both Gustave’s lover and sister look so much like Clea?
To a point all 3 have moles in the same places (weird as hell on Gustave’s part, but let’s not focus on that)
Several potential reasons:
❂ Aline’s grief and prolonged stay in the Canvas is bleeding all over. She’s losing herself, painting familiar things over and over, mixing and matching. Details get jumbled, confused, overlapped.
Gustave, Emma and Maelle are a perfect reference to Verso, Clea and Alicia, but Sophie is no reference to Clea - she’s the one that dies tragically, a portrait of the wrong sibling. Gustave is both a Verso and a Renoir figure to Maelle. It’s a mess.
It’s all an allegory for the cycle of grief, everyone going in circles, doing the same things again and again, playing the same roles.
❂ Gustave is Clea’s creation, put as a warden for Alicia. Would explain an incredible feat with the Lumina Converter, how he’s able to invent something that will manipulate chroma almost like a Painter does.
Esquie’s likeness is fitting in - Verso made him to protect and bring joy, with Clea overseeing and then going on adventures together with them - would make sense to create something similar if she wanted Alicia looked after.
If Gustave is Clea’s creation, then it’s reasonable for him to be so close with two lookalikes of her. And if Julie really was a creation of Clea’s, like painted Renoir thought, then she is falling into place as well, with her own weird connections to Gustave. Same thing with the matter of Simon’s missing hand and relations with Clea.
Gustave somehow survived that first encounter with a nevron on the beach - perhaps it recognised them to have the same creator?
This conversation with Verso could also be supporting it (if he's not adressing Maelle here):
The only thing that’s not here nor there is the Writer stuff, but it's somewhat explainable. If Gustave was stationed as a father/brother figure to Maelle, then the circumstances of her real brother’s death and the variables surrounding it would inevitably have influence on him.
❂ The Writer stuff is there for Gustave because he exists in the real world and IS a Writer. The Esquie-Francois parallel is there because Verso and Gustave were friends, he’s the reason Verso likes trains and has a hidden reading room, he’s the source of Alicia’s interest in writing. This is the reason for Gustave's ties with Julie, as they are both traitors, why he has both hands intact in the nightmare sequence about Verso’s death, why he has “From Fire” skill, why there is a guest room with Sophie’s clothes - those point at him, and a connection with Sophie is pointing at a connection with either Clea, or Verso…
Pure crack, but if that’s true, the other options are not necessarily false - Aline’s losing her mind at this point, so it’s not far fetched that she’d paint a portrait of an enemy; Clea could do it as a harsh lesson or a cruel joke, but that is less likely.
If there is a Gustave in the real world, then the rings on his mechanical arm would be relevant to him just as much as to Maelle, point at how his story is also fragmented:
3456 - E33 plot, up to his death;
0123 - backstory // veiled re-introduction curator-Renoir style;
6789 - full reveal on what’s up with him.
(He's constantly looking at those numbered rings on his hand like it's a watch too, which is. Interesting.)
It's an insane twist for a sequel, which is like catnip to these writers.
14. There is a missing third ending.
We have two - 'A life to love' and 'A life to paint'. Those correspond to the boss themes of the real and painted Renoir. But there’s a third theme with the same naming convention - Alicia’s 'A life to dream'.
She gives Verso a letter with that title on an envelope. She writes about her wish for a better outcome, where everyone can get what they want. If he just given that letter to Maelle, things could have turned out different, but he didn’t - he’s too set in his ways, Gustave is dead because of it, Alicia is soon to follow. It’s an impossible ending, a conclusion that could have never happened, 'A life to dream' indeed.
In addition to that, both 'A life to love' and 'A life to paint' connect to Verso and Maelle, act 2 and act 3 title-namesakes. Who's missing here? Gustave's missing here, he's the one act 1 is named after. And he's exactly the one who would be able to put both Maelle and Verso straight, mediate, find a better solution. He's caring, he's a visionary, he'd think of something, he's a perfect candidate to carry 'A life to dream', but he can't, he's not there.
And I don't buy Verso's reasoning for letting Gustave die. He watched over them for years, he has to almost-know the guy at that point. If anyone was able to punch through Verso's thick skull, it would be someone like Gustave, and he saw it, I know he saw it. He cared, to a point he seemed scared shitless of Gustave's ghost. Verso can deny being 'Verso' all he wants, but he still Alicia's, Maelle's brother, it's in his very nature to love what she loves.
What's also incredibly bizzare is that act 1 spends so much time pointing out that Gustave will choose Maelle over the collective, greater good, whatever else - his intrests and Verso's clearly allign. Why discard a potential ally? "Couldn't take any chances" are you sure about that?
With Gustave still alive, maybe there was a chance for a different outcome, but instead there's just void, where him and 'A life to dream' are supposed to be. So we have what we have.
UNLESS THEY ACKNOWLEDGE THAT MAYBE ALL THOSE LIVES IN THE CANVAS MATTER, ALL THOSE SACRIFICES MADE BY THE EXPEDITIONERS MATTER, IT’S NOT A PRISON OR A LIE. DROP A DLC!!!!
Isn't it odd to put such an emphasis on number 3, only to leave us with 2 endings, anyway?
